One in five vertebrates threatened by extinction

A new study in Science says 20 percent of terrestrial and marine vertebrates …

Twenty years ago, nearly all the world’s nations agreed to significantly reduce the loss of biodiversity by 2010. (The United States signed the accord but, like other treaties, the Senate has not ratified it.) Well, it’s 2010 and we are nowhere near that goal. While the Convention on Biological Diversity is currently meeting to update its targets for 2020, a new study released by Science says one-fifth of the world’s vertebrate species are threatened with extinction. But the good news is things would be a whole lot worse if we had done nothing at all.

"What our results show is that conservation efforts are not wasted. They are making a noticeable difference," said Ana Rodrigues, a researcher at the Center for Evolutionary and Functional Ecology in Montpelier, France, and one of the authors of the study. The researchers compiled the status of over 25,000 vertebrate species as rated by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List. "The rates of decline in the Red List index would have been 18 percent steeper" in the absence of conservation programs.

Preserving biodiversity may seem like a frivolous goal to some, given the current economic recession, but diverse and stable ecosystems provide many services, including clean drinking water, pollination, pest control, pollution abatement, and so on.

"These ecosystem services, as they are called, are estimated to be worth $33 trillion per year, ten times the size of the UK GDP, for example," said Stuart Butchart, an ornithologist with BirdLife International and one of the paper’s authors. "Economists have calculated that not stepping up our efforts on biodiversity loss will cost us seven percent of the global GDP by 2050, and that doesn’t even include the consequences of resource conflicts, refugees, and political instability that will happen when these systems reach tipping points of collapse."

Regardless of the economic costs of lost biodiversity, the study’s raw numbers are disheartening. One in eight birds are threatened with extinction, along with one in four mammals, one in seven bony fish, one in four reptiles, one in three amphibians, and one in three sharks. While the survey found threatened vertebrates on land and in oceans across the globe, most of the imperiled species inhabit tropical regions.

Southeast Asia stands out above other regions as having both the highest concentration of threatened species and the highest rate at which species decline in status. What’s to blame? "It’s a combination of habitat loss and overexploitation," Rodrigues told Ars. Oil palm plantations have gobbled up large swaths of forest in the region, while the bushmeat and cage-bird trades threaten many species in the forests that remain, Butchart added.

In other regions, invasive species and new diseases have been largely responsible for dwindling populations and outright extinctions. Chytridiomycosis, an infectious disease, has been pummeling amphibian populations in California, Central America, Australia, and the Andes Mountains. In fact, the disease has so widely affected amphibian populations that more than 40 percent of amphibian species are classified as threatened on the Red List.

Though a lower percentage of birds and mammals are threatened, many are under constant pressure from invasive species. Species introduced to the Hawaiian Islands have driven many native fauna extinct and many more to the brink, Butchart said. Fortunately, conservationists have become relatively adept at dealing with invasive species, at least compared to other threats like habitat loss. Forty percent of animals threatened by invasive species improve in status once the interlopers are dealt with, the study reports.

There have also been a few remarkable recoveries. The Mauritius kestrel, of which there were only four in 1974, is nearly fully recovered with around 1,000 birds thanks to a successful captive breeding program. The humpback whale is another standout example. Due to the 1955 ban on commercial whaling, one of the world’s largest mammals is now classified as “least concern.”

Conservation’s successes prove extinction threats are not entirely intractable, though many problems like habitat loss will require political, social, and economic cooperation to successfully tackle. More protected areas, both on land and in the ocean, will go a long way, but there is not one answer. "What we need is tailored solution to a particular problem," Rodrigues said. "It’s not just one solution that will work everywhere in the same way."

73 Reader Comments

As much as I love biodiversity and enjoy the beauty of God's creation, if we try for thirty years to save a species without much luck, I think evolution is trying to tell us something... It seems like every time a species goes extinct it's blamed on humanity. Now, I'm sure that an unfortunate number of species have had their extinction greatly contributed to by humanity, but many were "supposed" to go extinct by the very nature of the evolutionary process.

As for the nature's plan debate, the degree to which modern humans have stepped outside of the Earth's gradual evolutionary progression in the past few thousand years can not be understated. Similarly, the consequences of our actions on the rest of the biosphere should not be underestimated. We've multiplied in numbers and spread our influence to every habitat that can support us.

Yes, the gradual process of evolution has undoubtedly demonstrated abrupt spikes in the past too, usually in the form of some sort of "natural disaster". But the sprawl and maul tactics of modern day man surely is the single greatest catalyst for regional declines in biodiversity.

I don't mention this to condemn modern man, since to us, the process has been "natural" (more or less). But we should at least admit responsibility as a species, lest we continue to have negative impact.

As much as I love biodiversity and enjoy the beauty of God's creation, if we try for thirty years to save a species without much luck, I think evolution is trying to tell us something... It seems like every time a species goes extinct it's blamed on humanity. Now, I'm sure that an unfortunate number of species have had their extinction greatly contributed to by humanity, but many were "supposed" to go extinct by the very nature of the evolutionary process.

It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead...

Grafux wrote:

I don't mention this to condemn modern man, since to us, the process has been "natural" (more or less). But we should at least admit responsibility as a species, lest we continue to have negative impact.

While the survey found threatened vertebrates on land and in oceans across the globe, most of the imperiled species inhabit tropical regions.

I just saw a TED talk on this the other day. Part of the reason for this is because tropical regions are known for their high diversity, as well as high value for the animal trade. Millions of animals are captured from the wild and sold to the highest bidder, and a large percentage of those animals are on the endangered list. It’s like supply and demand; the endangered animals fetch a higher premium, and thus are hunted even more.

The problem doesn’t stop there though, even if the animal traffickers are caught, the local governments are not usually equipped to deal with the animals and so they are forced to euthanize them.

(this may sound odd, why not just release them back into the wild? But there are many reasons why it is not usually so simple)

As much as I love biodiversity and enjoy the beauty of God's creation, if we try for thirty years to save a species without much luck, I think evolution is trying to tell us something... It seems like every time a species goes extinct it's blamed on humanity. Now, I'm sure that an unfortunate number of species have had their extinction greatly contributed to by humanity, but many were "supposed" to go extinct by the very nature of the evolutionary process.

:facepalm:

so you or your neighbour go to a forest, shoot the damn thing, sell it for bushmeat on hte black market, and this is evolution in action.

What happens when a robber gets in your house, shoots your wife, and sells her stolen jewlery on the black market - evolution in action I bet. Incredible.

"It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead..."

You can moralize all you like but from a strictly rational standpoint the death of one species in favor of a stronger one (survival of the fittest) is the DEFINITION of evolution.

It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead...

Well thank you, right kindly there, Suinus. Now about those golden marmosets. What shall we tell the Brazilians? That they cannot have the lifestyle that they want just because of some flea bitten little marmoset? If we did that and the Brazilians were smart, they'd run out and kill off the marmosets just for self-defence. I don't know about you, but I have learned the hard way to never underestimate peoples of third world countries. They're smarter than we allow for.

As much as I love biodiversity and enjoy the beauty of God's creation, if we try for thirty years to save a species without much luck, I think evolution is trying to tell us something... It seems like every time a species goes extinct it's blamed on humanity. Now, I'm sure that an unfortunate number of species have had their extinction greatly contributed to by humanity, but many were "supposed" to go extinct by the very nature of the evolutionary process.

It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead...

And their inability to adapt to different habitat or develop defenses to said loss of native habitat has nothing to do with the evolutionary process... right?

To use the spoils of their farming and logging to fund conservation efforts, mostly.

K1LLTACULAR wrote:

And their inability to adapt to different habitat or develop defenses to said loss of native habitat has nothing to do with the evolutionary process... right?

So the lack of evolution is evolution now. How terribly liquid and convenient, never mind that it's ridiculous to expect complex lifeforms to adapt so broadly on a pittance of a timescale, fallacious to make appeals to nature and asinine to shift blame so clumsily.

As much as I love biodiversity and enjoy the beauty of God's creation, if we try for thirty years to save a species without much luck, I think evolution is trying to tell us something... It seems like every time a species goes extinct it's blamed on humanity. Now, I'm sure that an unfortunate number of species have had their extinction greatly contributed to by humanity, but many were "supposed" to go extinct by the very nature of the evolutionary process.

It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead...

And their inability to adapt to different habitat or develop defenses to said loss of native habitat has nothing to do with the evolutionary process... right?

Perhaps there are some semantic issues at play here.

Is the loss of habitat = to a change in habitat?

The way I see it, a loss of habitat means that the area in which they are accustomed to living, is growing smaller due to human encroachment. The animals cannot adapt to a place that humans will not allow them to live.

A change in habitat is where the habitat that the animal is accustomed to living in, changes in someway that no longer favors the animal. (like increased/decrease in mean temperature, pollution, natural disaster, etc.)

Which one is a natural process and which one isn't? You can really only apply(or imply) evolution to one of these scenarios.

It is interesting to read about the numbers of species which may become extinct, but I wonder by what methodology the figures were derived.

Evolution has been going on since life started. And there have been millions of species which have become extinct, and millions of species which have replaced them. But what is a species anyway? We can feel sorry for an individual who dies, but a species is an abstraction and a species does not die, it becomes extinct when there are no longer any members.

It is said that nature abhors a vacuum and this is true for species as well: if there is an environmental niche, a species will fill it. And, the new species will have superior characteristics. Would we, if we were God-like, choose Neanderthal man to survive and modern Cro-Magnon man to be disadvantaged to permit the Neaderthals to survive? Of course not. But preserving a declining species is a fruitless exercise. If a species cannot compete against a superior species, why try to save it? This is a form of acting God-like: why not just let it become extinct?

Those of us who have visited Australia and New Zealand, are astonished to find that the self-same environmental niches exist in those places, but the species who fill them are quited different from Europe or North America. But exotic creatures imported to those regions are often better suited environmentally and cause great disturbances to the local animal species.

Are we in danger if the species identified in this article go extinct? Not at all, if there is a niche -- nature will fill it. That is the nature of evolution.

Should we try to save endangered species? Yes, if, like the Panda it is a unique life form and beloved by people everywhere. But, the four-banded rat which has caused environmentalists to lobby politicians to stop construction, the snail darter, and other so called endangered species who are protected seems to me to be illogical and stupid.

As WS Gilbert wrote in Mikado

"I've got a little list--I've got a little list Of society offenders who might well be underground, And who never would be missed--who never would be missed!"

CHORUS. You may put 'em on the list--you may put 'em on the list; And they'll none of 'em be missed--they'll none of 'em be missed!

Let's just let them go to extinction as nature intended, doing anything else is playing God.

K1LLTACULAR wrote:And their inability to adapt to different habitat or develop defenses to said loss of native habitat has nothing to do with the evolutionary process... right?

You are looking at this in to short of a perspective. Very few organisms can survive and thrive after a radical change to their environment. To claim a Golden Lion Tamarin is not "evolutionarily fit" because it cannot live in a short-grass prairie (essentially the first stage after a forest has been removed) is disingenuous. It evolved to take advantage of an older-growth rainforest. It is not supposed to be successful in other environments. You can also assert that a scorpion is not evolutionarily fit because it cannot survive in the arctic, or an obligate saltwater fish in freshwater.

Organisms evolve to take advantage of the available habitat and it occurs over large spans of time. If you remove that habitat most of the organisms there will perish. In a very broad and general sense you are correct. The animal could not adapt to a changing (and homogenizing) world. However to claim that organisms should quite easily be able to evolve in response to rapid habitat changes (habitats that have existed for thousands of years) does not stand on a good understanding of evolutionary biology.

Those of us who have visited Australia and New Zealand, are astonished to find that the self-same environmental niches exist in those places, but the species who fill them are quited different from Europe or North America. But exotic creatures imported to those regions are often better suited environmentally and cause great disturbances to the local animal species.

From what I have studied, alien plants and animals typically do well in tropical climates because there is an abundance of food year round. The animals are often over adapted to the habitat and push out other plants and animals that have adapted to a less competitve environment.

A good example is all of the Birds of Paradise. Their evolutionary course took them up a chain where finding food is a low priority, and so they developed extravagent rituals and characteristics for breeding instead. Now, if you introduce another type of animal that is more accustomed to fighting and foraging for its food, the BOP will be at a huge disadvantage and will be pushed out of its ideal habitat. This niche bird was only able to develop the characteristics that it has over a long period of time and for only one specific type of environemt. Rapid changes in an environemnt almost always equals extinction. Most animals that survive this change already have the evolutionary skills to do so, and over time become more specialized in surviving in the new environment. Since the BOP is so specialized and is located in only a few specific areas on the planet, to expect them to "evolve or die" seems pretty uniformed and only really shows:

A: lack of understanding in the natural processes which guide evolutionB: lack of understanding on how climate adaptability is not the only evolutionary pressure animals faceC: lack of concern/understanding of how species extinction affects us and/or why it matters

The way I see it, a loss of habitat means that the area in which they are accustomed to living, is growing smaller due to human encroachment. The animals cannot adapt to a place that humans will not allow them to live.

A change in habitat is where the habitat that the animal is accustomed to living in, changes in someway that no longer favors the animal. (like increased/decrease in mean temperature, pollution, natural disaster, etc.)

Which one is a natural process and which one isn't? You can really only apply(or imply) evolution to one of these scenarios.

You're dead on. Loss of habitat can be both a direct loss and a change in habitat such that it's no longer suitable for the species. This can be natural, but for the bulk of the species surveyed here, habitat loss is due to some human activity.

To use the spoils of their farming and logging to fund conservation efforts, mostly.

I can tell you have never done any logging and you certainly have not done any farming. Here all that laughter in the background? It's those pesky Brazilians laughing at the stupid gringos going on about little furry animals while they, the Brazilians, are doing their best just to get by. They are not going to take this kind of stuff seriously and I don't blame them one whit.

Icaria wrote:

So the lack of evolution is evolution now. How terribly liquid and convenient, never mind that it's ridiculous to expect complex lifeforms to adapt so broadly on a pittance of a timescale, fallacious to make appeals to nature and asinine to shift blame so clumsily.

Oh, so time is everything now, is it? Does a volcano wait politely while the indigenous species living on its flanks evacuate to another mountain or another island?

Icaria wrote:

So what's with the sudden influx of dingbats on Ars?

Can't say. You were here when I showed up. Maybe they were here all along and you never noticed.

Evolution has been going on since life started. And there have been millions of species which have become extinct, and millions of species which have replaced them. But what is a species anyway? We can feel sorry for an individual who dies, but a species is an abstraction and a species does not die, it becomes extinct when there are no longer any members.

So we can't feel sorry for a species going extinct? If you're going to begin a train of thought, at least follow it to some kind of meaningful conclusion.

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It is said that nature abhors a vacuum

Ugh. This almost makes quoting the Mikado seem profound.

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And, the new species will have superior characteristics.

a) no, "superior", is unqualified and b) way to sound like a super villain.

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Would we, if we were God-like, choose Neanderthal man to survive and modern Cro-Magnon man to be disadvantaged to permit the Neaderthals to survive? Of course not. But preserving a declining species is a fruitless exercise. If a species cannot compete against a superior species, why try to save it? This is a form of acting God-like: why not just let it become extinct?

So in your little thought experiment, you're equating human action with deity inaction (which I have to admit, sounds like a pretty accurate description of a deity). This is relevant how?

How about I run an old lady over with my car but I don't call an ambulance, out of fear of 'playing god'. No deities, no magic powers. As far as analogies go, what would you say to that?

I'm probably going to regret asking.

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Those of us who have visited Australia and New Zealand, are astonished to find that the self-same environmental niches exist in those places but the species who fill them are quited different from Europe or North America.

Astonished, are you? Says a lot, really.

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But exotic creatures imported to those regions are often better suited environmentally and cause great disturbances to the local animal species.

More than just local species of animal. Cane toads have upset an entire ecosystem. Wild camels, horses and excess kangaroos (the result of our diminishing the populations of their predators) are destroying the scrub and eroding the soil, creating dust storms that are enveloping entire cities. It's funny how fucking with natural systems that have been in place for thousands of years tends to have very real implications for humans.

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Are we in danger if the species identified in this article go extinct? Not at all, if there is a niche -- nature will fill it. That is the nature of evolution.

What you fail to mention, however, is that such equilibrium doesn't occur on the same time scales it takes for us to wipe out a species.

Quote:

Should we try to save endangered species? Yes, if, like the Panda it is a unique life form and beloved by people everywhere. But, the four-banded rat which has caused environmentalists to lobby politicians to stop construction, the snail darter, and other so called endangered species who are protected seems to me to be illogical and stupid.

Perhaps we should round up all the hedonists, take them behind the shed and shoot them, then blame it on nature.

To use the spoils of their farming and logging to fund conservation efforts, mostly.

I can tell you have never done any logging and you certainly have not done any farming. Here all that laughter in the background? It's those pesky Brazilians laughing at the stupid gringos going on about little furry animals while they, the Brazilians, are doing their best just to get by. They are not going to take this kind of stuff seriously and I don't blame them one whit.

I wouldn't even blame them one half-whit.

In other news, no one is profiting from logging and agriculture. You learn something new everyday.

Icaria wrote:

Oh, so time is everything now, is it? Does a volcano wait politely while the indigenous species living on its flanks evacuate to another mountain or another island?

Must be a big volcano to take out entire species but hey, if you want to compare humans to natural disasters, I'm not going to stop you; I'm hardly going to pass up someone making my argument for me.

Quote:

Can't say. You were here when I showed up. Maybe they were here all along and you never noticed.

"It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead..."

You can moralize all you like but from a strictly rational standpoint the death of one species in favor of a stronger one (survival of the fittest) is the DEFINITION of evolution.

This comment is the weakest show of understanding and logic I've ever seen.

(1) To what extent can biodiversity be protected?(2) What are the costs of protecting it?(3) What are the costs of not protecting it?

All this wittering on about evolution is utterly irrelevant.

Questions 1 and 2 are largely issues of political will. In order for anything to happen, we need to educate the public (sounds cliche, I know, but it's true) and demand action from our politicians. The U.S. has both been a leader and a laggard when it comes to endangered species. We basically pioneered the idea of protecting them, but we (the Senate, actually) currently refuse to ratify these treaties.

The answer to question 3 is simple. If we don't protect biodiversity, it will cost us 7 percent of global GDP by 2050. That'll be $5.73 trillion (with a T) per year according to IMF GDP forecasts. That's a little over one-third of the current U.S. GDP (and a little less than one-third in 2050).

While I think that reducing the rate of the decline in numbers of species is largely a good thing...something about this article reminds me of the US Presidents explanation on the economy. Well, it's still really really bad, but if we hadn't passed the stimulus, it would have been much worse.

Biodiversity is a good value to have. Supporting a wide variety of life on this planet is a noble goal. It is unfortunate that humans are responsible for some extinctions. However, there are times when a species has thrown in the evolutionary towel. Although trite, I think of the Dodo Bird that had evolved in such a non threatening environment with virtually no natural defenses that an errant seagull sneeze would have wiped them out if rodents and pigs had not. There are also times when scarcity of resources (non-anthropogenic) ends up favoring one species over another resulting in extinction.

While making a very strong good faith effort to support biodiversity is something I agree with, I believe that at some point it makes sense to let an endangered species die out even if it was humanity that caused the problem. Another trite example, but how many millions of dollars have we spent trying to get the damned Panda bear to just screw? Insert line from Fight Club here.

It is not reasonable to expect that the human species' fantastic evolutionary success will result in zero extinctions. I would like to keep this number as small as feasible, but the number and variety of species on this planet has fluctuated over time and will continue to do so. Thankfully we have the awareness to attempt to curb ourselves and the technology to preserve the genes of threatened species.

While I think that reducing the rate of the decline in numbers of species is largely a good thing...something about this article reminds me of the US Presidents explanation on the economy. Well, it's still really really bad, but if we hadn't passed the stimulus, it would have been much worse.

Biodiversity is a good value to have. Supporting a wide variety of life on this planet is a noble goal. It is unfortunate that humans are responsible for some extinctions. However, there are times when a species has thrown in the evolutionary towel. Although trite, I think of the Dodo Bird that had evolved in such a non threatening environment with virtually no natural defenses that an errant seagull sneeze would have wiped them out if rodents and pigs had not. There are also times when scarcity of resources (non-anthropogenic) ends up favoring one species over another resulting in extinction.

While making a very strong good faith effort to support biodiversity is something I agree with, I believe that at some point it makes sense to let an endangered species die out even if it was humanity that caused the problem. Another trite example, but how many millions of dollars have we spent trying to get the damned Panda bear to just screw? Insert line from Fight Club here.

It is not reasonable to expect that the human species' fantastic evolutionary success will result in zero extinctions. I would like to keep this number as small as feasible, but the number and variety of species on this planet has fluctuated over time and will continue to do so. Thankfully we have the awareness to attempt to curb ourselves and the technology to preserve the genes of threatened species.

You're not wrong that some extinctions are inevitable, but I think the sheer number that are threatened by it is what is worrying. Add to that the value of the services they provide us (not just aesthetic or emotional but real monetary value) and you'll see why so many scientists are concerned.

To those who say its the animals fault for not adapting: If I bulldoze your house, and keep you from eating, then shoot you because you are in my way is that me playing God? Think you would say it's fair? After all, its not my fault you didn't adapt (or run faster).

To those who say its the animals fault for not adapting: If I bulldoze your house, and keep you from eating, then shoot you because you are in my way is that me playing God? Think you would say it's fair? After all, its not my fault you didn't adapt (or run faster).

+1Why don't human grow a bullet resistant skin and a third leg to run faster?

In other news, no one is profiting from logging and agriculture. You learn something new everyday.

I did not say that. I just pointed out that it was obvious that you had never done either of them. You would otherwise understand what it means to earn your bread by the sweat of your brow.

Icaria wrote:

Must be a big volcano to take out entire species but hey, if you want to compare humans to natural disasters, I'm not going to stop you; I'm hardly going to pass up someone making my argument for me.

Nor would I. And you just have. Have you sat down and thought this matter all the way through, yet? Why would anyone who is sane, place the welfare of an animal, above their own? Is that all the value you place on human life?

You can moralize all you like but from a strictly rational standpoint the death of one species in favor of a stronger one (survival of the fittest) is the DEFINITION of evolution.

No, it's not. Evolution is defined through multigenerational differential survivability of adaptations by natural selection. Very short term changes brought about by external influences such as invasive species, dehabitation, and natural disasters afford no natural selection and thus, no evolution.

One cannot "evolve" their way out of humans cutting down old-growth rainforest anymore than you can "evolve" your way out of a bullet, or the animals on Krakatoa evolve their way out of dying in the blast of the volcano. Read SgtCupCake's comment above -- he gets it right.

To those who say its the animals fault for not adapting: If I bulldoze your house, and keep you from eating, then shoot you because you are in my way is that me playing God? Think you would say it's fair? After all, its not my fault you didn't adapt (or run faster).

+1Why don't human grow a bullet resistant skin and a third leg to run faster?

The "animals that can't evolve must die" crowd is fascinating...

Not to mention that many times when the animals do "evolve" they're none to happy about that either. I'm thinking about coyotes and cougars in the city of Chicago here. And all the "Oh NOSE, they'll eat my dog or cat!" That's evolution for you. Coyotes have learned to eat dog.

It isn't evolution that's driving the golden lion tamarin to extinction. It's habitat loss, driven by us. But if it makes you feel better thinking that this is Nature's doing, that we don't have nothing to do it, aren't to blame and don't have to do nothing to minimize our impact on biodiversity, go right ahead...

Well thank you, right kindly there, Suinus. Now about those golden marmosets. What shall we tell the Brazilians? That they cannot have the lifestyle that they want just because of some flea bitten little marmoset? If we did that and the Brazilians were smart, they'd run out and kill off the marmosets just for self-defence. I don't know about you, but I have learned the hard way to never underestimate peoples of third world countries. They're smarter than we allow for.

Hey, for all you know, I can be a Brazilian. E se fosse, continuaria a pensar do mesmo modo...

I was going to reply to those some of the "animals that can't evolve must die" crowd posts' but Demani, WaggishWombat & tigerhawkvok have done it quite well...